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A modest turnout for a Pleasanton Unified School District community meeting at Pleasanton Middle School on Wednesday night gave attendees the opportunity to learn more deeply about how their local schools are funded and the district’s efforts to close achievement gaps among students.
The Nov. 20 meeting was attended by about two dozen parents, several high schoolers, and PUSD administration including Superintendent David Haglund, Pleasanton Middle Principal Joe Nguyen, and the entire Board of Trustees minus President Valerie Arkin, who was on vacation.
After a brief introduction, Haglund provided some recent district highlights such as Fairlands Elementary, Harvest Park Middle School and Amador Valley High School earning the #1 spots on Niche.com’s 2020 Best Schools Rankings for the best elementary, middle and high schools in Alameda County. Haglund also updated the audience on Measure I1 projects like the Lydiksen rebuild and modernization, portable replacements at Amador and Foothill, and the recent issuance of $90 million in Measure I1 bonds.
The Measure I1 updates segued into a presentation in which Haglund explained where and how PUSD receives and spends its funding, the difference between basic aid and revenue limit school districts and parcel vs. property taxes, and compared the comparative tax rates among different school districts in Alameda County. This led into an update about the $323 million bond that will be on the March 2020
ballot and an overview of the bond project list, which included modernizing and replacing the gyms and theaters at Foothill and Amador.
Tonya Bass, a PUSD parent liaison and mother of three children enrolled at Foothill and Hart Middle School, told the Weekly that she thought the presentation was “very informative, especially the bonds.” She also said it was “nice that we get to talk to (administrators) one-on-one” at the less formal community meetings, and added that she would “encourage others to attend the next event” for those reasons.
“I thought that was very informative, the way (Haglund) described it. He broke it down so you understood exactly what he meant,” Bass said. “When I make decisions to vote, it will definitely change my outlook because now I understand what (the bond measure) is.”
Bass also said she appreciated learning about how the district has been working to recognize and close achievement gaps among students who are academically struggling. An audience member during the meeting’s comment portion had asked what data, strategies and intervention programs PUSD was using to identify and meet the needs of at-risk students.
“We have various different data sets that we use; the state data isn’t very helpful to us because it’s always after the fact and we get the data after we disconnect with the student at the grade level, so I would say that the state student achievement is not a good tool for us to use,” Haglund said.
Haglund then explained how lower-grade teachers in the district have been implementing the Measures of Academic Performance (MAPS) system, a growth assessment in math and language arts given to students in grades 3 through 5 that he has seen other schools successfully use.
“It was very, very helpful for us to get to the gap identification, and the reports that came out of the system also identified the specific area of misunderstanding within a standard that the student was struggling with and so you could easily form groups of students to do an intervention,” Haglund said. “Nobody fails algebra–they fail numbers or fractions or some other function of math that they didn’t completely learn when they were younger, and as soon as you can address that learning need, the ability to work an algebraic function becomes much more attainable to that student.”
In response to being asked about meeting the needs of students in high school, Haglund said, “There’s two ways to look at that–one is there’s the kids we have sitting right in front of us and we have to help these kids that need help right now. But we also have to address the problem that produced that kid–what’s the gap academically in the instructional program that along the way that led to the student to having a deficit. So we need to look at it both ways.”
Another PUSD community meeting will be held at Amador Valley High School in mid-January as well as another at Donlon Elementary during spring.
I wish David Haglund were to lay out for the Residents why Schools districts have to resort to Bond Measures? Why can’t the School Districts balance their budget, manage their operations within the money received from Taxation, Lottery, Federal, State and County Government aid? Do they realize Bond Measure is just taxation, it means less money for other businesses and activities in the City. It means School Districts are regressing economic progress of the city.
Naveed, What makes you think our school district is to blame? We are in California where the burden has shifted to both state and local funding for all school districts. No one likes taxes to PAY taxes but its what makes for “free” public schools. At least our kids can receive a good education here in Pleasanton without having to pay for private school tuition. Here’s a primer if you don’t believe me about all school districts having to rely on the community to approve bonds to pay for facilities. https://ed100.org/blog/school-facilities-in-california-who-pays
Did anyone opposing or with a different view about the bonds ask to speak at the meeting?
It sounds like the district is going to do several of these “meetings” before the election on district property.
Did you know that you can speak (equal time, equipment, etc.) in front of the room, just like the district employees?
It’s required by law, Education Code 7058. You have to get up off your you-know-what and ask (demand) equal time for a presentation. You could even pass out flyers or other materials. If the district passes out bond “information,” then I’d demand that the district produce your materials (of equal quantity) as well.
No you know. Knowledge is power, if you use it.
Forgot to mention, this.
The district’s web site and any school web site or facility that is posting “information” is also a “public forum.”
Get your differing view materials posted on the web sites and at the facilities. Same law Education Code 7058 applies.
Rather than permit this kind of activity, one district took down the materials so it wouldn’t provide materials from any other point of view.
A well intended event, but lacked substance to support where the money is going, specifically. This is just meant to raise (more) money because another bond is ending. That is the motivation not any specific need
Bond and parcel tax measures only result in corruption, not in better schools.
Just look in Livermore – after our parcel tax Livermore Superintendent Kelly Bowers immediately gave herself a $60K a year raise and now (after even more raises) makes $410K a year. And the biggest lie is “money will not be spent on administrator salaries and pensions”. Immediately after the school bond passed Kelly Bowers hired her SON, used money meant for school buildings to buy herself administrative offices in the hills, and now spends $600K of the borrowed bond money every year on administrative salaries ACCORDING to THE AUDIT.
Yeah! Livermore Parent said her catchphrase! Man, it seems like there’s barely been an episode of Town Square in which that popular, quirky character Livermore Parent doesn’t show up to say “Livermore superintendent‘s raise,” and boy, does that line bring down the house. She’s like Kramer and Urkel rolled up into one super fan-favorite whose one catchphrase gets better each time she says it. “Livermore superintendent’s raise” – man, that will NEVER get old!
Just so you know on this story as well. The State of California has a $15 Billion bond measure on the March 2020 ballot ironically called “Prop 13” but its nothing like the original. Read John Coupal’s commentary on the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association website.